I’ll have to wake up my six-year-old son to come to the bunkhouse with us, but you also know I’ll do it because I owe you so much.”
“Nonsense, you don’t owe me anything.” Together they put their cups in the sink and then headed for the stairs.
Nicolette told Cassie good-night as she veered into the first bedroom, where her son had unpacked his suitcase and was now seated on the bed clad in his pajamas with his handheld game system in play.
“Whoa, what are you doing in your pajamas already?” Nicolette asked. “You know it’s always bath time before bedtime.”
Sammy didn’t look up from his game. “I took a bath last night, Mom. That means I don’t have to take a bath until next Friday night. I told you that I’ve decided I’m going to be a cowboy.”
“Sammy, I’m not going to argue with you about this. Now, get into the bathroom and into the tub.”
He finally looked up at her, his blue eyes filled with innocence. “But, we’re on a ranch and I just told you I’m a cowboy like Cowboy Lucas and he told me cowboys only take a bath once a week.” His chin jutted out in a show of stubbornness.
“Cowboy Lucas was just joking,” Nicolette replied, knowing that it was her own words and Lucas’s response that had prompted this ridiculous problem.
Normally Sammy was a good, obedient child, but on the rare occasion he got that chin-jutting going on he became a monster child who could throw a tantrum as big as the entire state of Oklahoma.
“He wasn’t joking. He didn’t even smile when he told me cowboys took baths once a week,” Sammy replied and folded his arms across his chest.
A rising irritation began to build in Nicolette, not because of the child on the bed, but rather toward the man who had filled his head with such nonsense.
“If Cowboy Lucas tells you he was just joking with you, then will you be a good boy and get into the bath?” Nicolette asked.
Sammy looked at her suspiciously. “I gotta hear it from him. You can’t just pretend that you talked to him and then tell me that he said I had to take a bath. I gotta hear it from the cowboy’s mouth.”
Nicolette stared at her son in dismay. She knew she could do one of two things—she could demand that her son obey her, resulting in tension and tears and a battle she was too weary to endure, or she could go get that handsome cowboy and straighten this out once and for all.
“You wait right here,” she said, and then left his room and walked down the hallway to the master suite. The door was open and Cassie had already changed from her clothes into her nightshirt. “Cassie, could you do me a favor and keep an eye on Sammy while I go chase down a cowboy?”
Cassie raised a blond eyebrow and gave her a teasing grin. “I never took you for the pushy type, but I have to admit he was rather hot.”
“Aren’t you a funny one,” Nicolette said drily. “I need to make Cowboy Lucas talk to Sammy and tell him that cowboys bathe every night, not just once a week.”
“Uh-oh, sounds like our ideas about cowboys have come back to bite our backsides,” Cassie said. She grabbed Nicolette by the arm and they headed back to Sammy’s bedroom.
“I’ll read him a story. You’d better find a flashlight if you have to go all the way to the bunkhouse. You don’t want to step in any cow poop.” Cassie grinned and then gave Nicolette a quick hug. “I can’t thank you enough for taking this journey with me. Now, go find your cowboy.”
“He’s not my cowboy,” Nicolette muttered darkly as she headed down the stairs. She went into the kitchen to look in the cabinet under the sink, which seemed a likely place to store a flashlight.
“Bingo.” She grabbed the big yellow-handled light and headed for the door in the kitchen that would take her outside and in the direction of the bunkhouse.
She just wanted this night to be over. The past week had been frenzied with them closing up the store indefinitely, packing and preparing for their trip here. The day had been particularly long as their plane had been delayed twice in a layover in Chicago. Then there was the task of obtaining a rental car and taking the forty-minute drive from Oklahoma City to Bitterroot and the ranch.
She shone the flashlight beam on the ground before her as she made her way toward the building in the distance. Thank goodness she was also aided by the light of a full moon overhead.
In truth, she’d rather eat dirt than ask Lucas for his help, but he owed it to her considering he was the one who had told Sammy cowboys bathed only once a week.
Well, if she was perfectly truthful with herself, she was the one who had first told Sammy that, but that had been before she’d actually met a cowboy. She’d never dreamed she would be on a ranch with real cowboys, and she marveled now at all the paths she’d walked so far in her relatively short life.
She’d gone from wife to a wealthy man, to near poverty and single parenthood in what felt like the blink of an eye. What little money she’d had when she’d left her husband she’d invested in the store, but that venture was barely making money. New York was a brutal city if you didn’t have money.
She looked ahead to the structure looming close. Lucas had been right; it did look like a twelve-unit motel. It was easy to see which one was Lucas’s, as it was the only unit that had lights shining out the window.
Her stomach tensed as she approached the door. Even though she’d told Sammy first about cowboys not taking baths, Lucas should have told him different. It was his fault that this whole mess had happened with Sammy.
With more than a touch of irritation rising inside her, she knocked briskly. He opened the door and her breath caught just a bit. Without his hat, his dark, slightly shaggy dark hair gleamed in the light. His intense blue eyes widened before he raised a hand in front of his face.
“Turn off that flashlight,” he exclaimed.
Warmth leaped into her cheeks as she realized she’d had the light shining directly on his handsome, chiseled features. She quickly clicked it off. “Sorry about that.”
He stepped outside and looked around. “What are you doing out here all by yourself in the dark?”
“You told my son that cowboys only bathe once a week and now Sammy won’t get into the bathtub.”
By the light of the room spilling out where they stood, she saw his amusement curve his lips upward. “Is that a fact,” he replied. “Sounds like a personal problem to me.”
“It’s all your fault,” she said, at the same time trying not to notice the wonder of his broad shoulders, the slim hips that wore his jeans so well.
He raised a dark eyebrow. “The way I see it, you started it.” He turned his head and spit to one side. “Oh, sorry about that. I’m just doing what cowboys do.”
This time the heat that filled her cheeks was a new wave of pure embarrassment. “Look, I’m sorry. When I told my son those things, I’d never really met a cowboy before. The only cowboy I’ve ever even seen in my entire life is the naked singing cowboy in Times Square.”
This time both his dark brows rose in surprise.
