The Reluctant Texas Rancher

“A romance with a man who’s not going to stick around for the long haul is the last thing Liz needs,” Faye Elizabeth grumbled.

Tired of having her life decided for her, by everyone but her, Liz sighed and grabbed her briefcase and her breakfast. “I’m out of here,” she told one and all grouchily.

To her consternation, by the time she reached the parking area, Travis’s pickup truck was disappearing down a dirt road that traversed the ranch.

Figuring she could talk to him later, she headed for the Laramie County sheriff’s station.

“You have to stop picking fights with people,” Liz told J.T. when they met up in the courtroom.

Disheveled and exhausted from a night spent in the holding cell, he remained defiant. “People,” he returned cantankerously, “need to stop waging battles with me.”

“This isn’t what your late wife would want for you.”

He ignored her reference to his beloved Cyndi. “I want that pool.” He peered at Liz. “And I know you can figure out a way for it to happen.”

Talk about the impossible.

She sighed.

“Meantime, if I get community service for this, make sure it’s something outside,” J.T. continued. “I hate being cooped up.”

Liz tried another approach. “You don’t have to plead guilty to the misdemeanor charges. I can get them dropped if you’ll only agree to get some grief counseling.”

J.T. scowled. “You know how I feel about that.”

“Nothing is going to make your grief go away, I know,” Liz repeated his oft-muttered sentiment.

“Exactly.”

Figuring that, under the circumstances, community service couldn’t hurt, since it would get him out of the house, Liz did as he asked.

The guilty plea was entered; he was lectured by the exasperated judge and assigned twenty hours of community service cleaning up local streets.

An hour later, she was headed back to the office.

It was noon by the time she arrived at the ranch.

Pale gray clouds were obscuring the horizon. Reba, Tillie and Faye Elizabeth were in the midst of gathering up their purses—and raincoats, just in case.

“What’s going on?” Liz asked. Given the fact it was a Saturday, they could be headed anywhere.

Tillie stuffed her notepad and pen in her handbag. Reba grabbed the keys to her own SUV. “We’re making our monthly shopping trip to the warehouse club in San Angelo.”

Liz wished she’d had more notice. Not having any destroyed her ability to adequately adjust her own workload. Nevertheless, she had a responsibility here. “Give me a couple of minutes and I’ll go with you.”

“That would be great!” her grandmother said. “We’ll wait while you change clothes.”

Reba gave her mother a chiding look, then turned back to Liz. “Actually, honey, we need you here, helping Travis move the cattle from pasture 53 to 62.”

With ten thousand acres of ranch land and only some of it currently fit for grazing, moving cattle around could be quite a task.

To her consternation, Tillie quickly reinforced that sentiment. “I don’t care how good Travis is on horseback, he can’t do it alone, dear. Well, not efficiently, anyway. Not with all the newborn calves and their mamas.”

“I’d do it myself if my hip were up to getting in the saddle,” Reba said.

Liz knew that to be true. There was nothing her mother liked more than cowgirl activities.

Liz ignored Faye Elizabeth’s lingering disapproval. There was no use aggravating her mother’s sciatica when it was just starting to mend. “Of course I’ll help with the cattle,” Liz said. She turned to Faye Elizabeth. “You don’t need to worry. I can handle Travis.”

Her grandmother harrumphed. “See that you do.”

Through discussing her love life—or lack thereof—Liz continued, practically, “When will you-all be back?”

“Around dinnertime, if all goes as planned …”

The ladies took off, and Liz went up to change clothes. Grimly, she downed an energy bar, saddled up and headed out.

Travis was where they’d said he would be, in pasture 53. He was hardly alone.

Reins in hand, she cantered over to join him. “Who are your buddies?”

They hadn’t had ranch dogs for some time.

These two were beauties.

Mutts, to be sure, but gorgeous ones. Both fast and agile as could be.

“Meet Mud.” Travis pointed to the smaller one. He had a thick brown-white-and-black coat and looked to be part border collie, part beagle. “And Jet.” He indicated a glossy black Labrador retriever–German shepherd mix.

“Hey, fellas.” Liz smiled from her place in the saddle.

“I borrowed them from my parents’ ranch,” Travis said. “They’ve got about two dozen cattle dogs out there, so we can keep them as long as we want them. What brings you out here?”

“I was told you needed help moving cattle.”

His expression didn’t change in the slightest. Yet there was something in his gray eyes. Some small glimmer of bemusement …

Liz stifled a moan. “They knew you had the dogs helping you, didn’t they?”

Which made her assistance unnecessary, as there were only seventy-five mama cows, with fifty baby calves to date. A lot for Liz’s mom to handle on her own, but nothing for a cowhand as fit and experienced as Travis. Especially when he was accompanied by two well-trained herding dogs.

He shrugged lazily in response to her question. “Introductions were made. Plans announced.”

Liz bit down on an oath. “Tillie and my mom are matchmaking.”

“But not Faye Elizabeth.”

Liz shrugged. “Of all of us, she’s the one who worries the most. So, you take that, plus her past—growing up without a dad, losing her husband so quickly after they married then watching my mom lose hers—I just don’t think she can bear to see any of us experience that kind of heartbreak again.”