held in a sigh, wondering how to extricate himself from this dilemma. He could help this woman and her brood, but he didn’t want to. Justin glanced at the four babies. They had calmed some as they were getting either bottles or a breast—there was a thought he had to stay away from.
Mrs. Harper bustled in with a tray of food for him and took the baby he was holding. “I heard you say that you need to talk business. I’ll feed this one, and you eat. Your plates say you’re from Montana, so you’ve come a long way to talk about work. I know you’re starved.”
No, no, no. He needed a job, but not this job. And the last thing he wanted to do was work for a woman with soft doe eyes and a place that was teetering on becoming unmanageable. From the little he’d seen, there was a lot to do. He had a bum knee and a bad feeling about this. And no desire to be around children.
On the other hand, it couldn’t hurt to help out for a week, maybe two, tops. Could it?
He ate a bite of Mrs. Harper’s chicken salad, startled by how good it was. Maybe it had been too long since he’d had home cooking. He smelled the wonderful cinnamon aroma of apple pie, and his stomach jumped.
Mackenzie bent over to put the fed, diapered and happy baby she was holding back into the bassinet. He watched her move, looked at her smile, admired her full fanny and breasts—stopped himself cold.
He had no business looking at a new mother. He really had been on the road too long. Glancing around him, Justin took in the soft white-and-blue curtains, the tan sofas, the chairs in a gentle blue-and-white pattern that complemented the drapes. A tan wool rug lay under a blocky coffee table, the edges rounded and perfect for children who would be learning to pull themselves up in a few months.
Taking another bite of Mrs. Harper’s delicious meal, he focused on the food and not the homey atmosphere. That’s what was wrong: this felt like home. It could draw in a man who wasn’t careful, who wasn’t aware of the pitfalls.
Maybe Ty hadn’t sent him here because of Mackenzie’s ad. Maybe she simply needed a grievous amount of help, and Ty had known he needed employment.
He could do this job—or at least he was comfortable with the work he could see that needed to be done.
But he needed to know.
“So about your ad,” he said, and Mackenzie and Mrs. Harper looked at him curiously. “On the dating website.”
She shook her head. “What dating website? I didn’t advertise on a website. I talked to some friends about the position for ranch foreman.” She straightened. “Are you saying you came all the way here from Montana because you think I’m looking for a man?”
Mackenzie planned to give Ty a piece of her mind at the first opportunity. A phone call to express her dismay at his ham-handed matchmaking was tops on her list.
The cowboy who’d clearly been sent on a mercy mission seemed supremely uncomfortable at the outraged question.
“I thought you were looking for help around here,” Justin said. “So, yes, I was under the impression you were looking for a man. Though not in the manner in which you may have mistaken.”
“Ty put me in a dating website, and you show up here. How would you feel if you were me?”
Mrs. Harper drifted from the room with a baby in her arms. Mackenzie was too upset to cool her temper.
“Probably grateful that one of my friends cared enough to reach out to try to get me some help. Incidentally, I haven’t seen the ad. Didn’t look.” He shrugged, dismissing it.
That was a man for you. It was all about the practicalities, when the mousetrap was perfectly clear to her. You didn’t live in Bridesmaids Creek and not know that people plotted to get you married. Always done lovingly in your best interests, of course.
Which was how she’d ended up married the first time—not that Tommy hadn’t been a sinfully gorgeous, totally lazy man more interested in pleasure than anything resembling work.
There was a lot of work to be done around the Hanging H, so named when one of the Hawthorne H’s had partially fallen off the sign. The name had stuck—though she knew very well that Daisy Donovan—one of the town’s most notorious bad girls—liked to say the ranch was called the Hanging H because the Hawthornes were barely hanging on. Mackenzie did need help, which would have been quite obvious to the handsome cowboy meeting her gaze without hesitation. Tommy might have been handsome in a hedonistic sort of way, but this cowboy had him beat for raw sex appeal.
“You’re right. If you’re here just for work, and not because of a matchmaking website, I’d like to talk to you more about the position.” She decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. Hazel eyes stared at her, unblinking. Justin didn’t look like he had romance on the mind. Broad shoulders complemented a trim waist, the sinewy body of a man who spent his time actively. He had a square jaw that hadn’t been shaved today—or maybe even yesterday—and shaggy dark hair that hadn’t seen a barber in many months.
All in all, the kind of man who would turn women’s heads.
“I’d be interested in hearing more about the kind of help you’re looking for,” he said.
She looked at her babies, tried to turn off the zip of sex appeal that was overruling her ability to think clearly. “Why would you want to work here? There must be a lot of ranches hiring.”
He nodded. “I’m sure I can find a job if this doesn’t work out. But Ty seemed to think you could use a foreman.”
“A foreman position would be a long-term proposition.” She looked at him, curious. “Somehow you don’t strike me as a long-term kind of man.”
“Things change.”
Okay. She’d noticed he had a bit of a limp, and there was probably a story to that. In fact, there was no doubt a story to Justin in general, but she wasn’t looking for a colorful background. She needed help here, and the fact was Ty’s reference counted for a lot. There was no doubting that Justin didn’t want to answer a lot of questions about himself, which was fine because she could ask Ty whatever she wanted to know. She could simply negotiate an open-ended employment offer with Justin.
“Yes, things do change. Thanks for helping out with the babies. If you give me ten minutes to get them settled and grab the books, I’ll go over the job requirements with you.”
He nodded. “Thanks.”
She gazed into his hazel eyes, seeing nothing there but appreciation for a chance of employment. No attraction, no flirtation; just level honesty.
Whatever it was she’d felt from the moment he’d walked into the room, he didn’t seem to be affected by it.
Which was fine.
She went to find Mrs. Harper to watch the babies while she talked to Justin. If she hired him, she was going to call Ty.
Whether Mackenzie thanked him or yelled at him about the cowboy in the other room remained to be seen.
* * *
TWO
