The Cowboy's Christmas Miracle

Carson made a face at his foreman, Neil Parker, as the two of them checked over his three pregnant mares, who were due to deliver in only a few months.

So far all was going well. This particular foal’s sire was a champion cutting horse from the world-famous Dalton horse operation just up the road, and Carson had high hopes the foal would follow in his daddy’s magnificent footsteps.

“I know that,” he answered Neil. “If the local stock growers’ association could have figured out a polite way not to invite me, I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“I doubt it’s personal. You just represent change and a different way of lookin’ at things, something that worries the oldtimers around here. New West versus Old West.”

Carson knew that. He knew his purchase of the vast acreage that used to be known as the Wagon Wheel had thrust him onto a hotly debated battleground. All across the West, old-guard ranchers were finding themselves saddled with land that was no longer profitable and practices that had become archaic and unwieldy.

Many of their children weren’t interested in ranching and the lifestyle that came with it. At the same time, ranchers fought development and the idea of splitting the land they had poured their blood and sweat into tract subdivisions.

As feed costs went up and real-estate values plummeted, many were caught in a no-win situation.

He knew old-timers resented when new people moved in, especially those who had the capital to enact sweeping, costly changes in ranching practices in an effort to increase yield. It was even worse in his situation since he wasn’t a permanent resident of his ranch and only came here a couple of times a month for a few days at a time.

He couldn’t avoid the snide comments in town when he came to Pine Gulch. And he knew Neil suffered worse, though his foreman was careful not to share those details with him.

Neil and his wife Melina had been with Carson for a decade, first as caretakers of the central California ranch he purchased several years ago and then at the small Montana ranch he still owned.

Carson loved ranching. He loved being out on his horses, loved the wildness and the raw beauty here, loved the risk and the rewards.

It wasn’t some big secret why that might be. That year he spent on his grandparents’ ranch a few miles away from here had been the happiest, most secure of his life. He wasn’t trying to recapture that, only to replicate it somewhere else if he could. And though Raven’s Nest was only a small segment of his vast empire, this was where he found the most peace.

He wanted to make it a success and he figured a little proactive public relations couldn’t hurt the situation in town. Life would be easier all the way around if Neil didn’t have to play politics with obstinate locals.

“I’m not some Hollywood rancher, only looking for a status symbol. We’re making something out of Raven’s Nest and I need to get that point across. That’s the whole reason I’m going to Viviana Cruz’s party. You and I have been running Raven’s Nest for ten months now and people still won’t accept that we’re serious about what we’re doing here.”

He thought of the coolness in Jenna Wheeler’s eyes when he had pulled her van out of the snow a few hours earlier and the surprise she had showed when he had done the neighborly thing and told her he would make sure her driveway was shoveled.

He didn’t know why her negative opinion of him bugged him so much. Plenty of people hated his guts. It was a normal side effect of both his position and his personality. He hadn’t made McRaven Enterprises so successful by being weak and accommodating.

Jenna probably figured she had reason to resent him. He was radically changing something her husband’s family had built over several generations.

He thought of what Hayden Wheeler had said the afternoon before. He’s the dude who stole our ranch. Had the boy’s mother been feeding him that kind of garbage? He didn’t like thinking she would be the sort to come off as some kind of martyr. She had listed her ranch for sale and he had paid more than a fair price for it. End of story. It was a business deal, pure and simple.

Hell, he’d even made concessions, like granting her the right-of-way to use the Raven’s Nest bridge and access road to the point where her driveway forked off it. Otherwise, she would have had to build a new road and another bridge across the creek, something costly and complicated.

He sighed and pushed the frustration away. What did it matter if she didn’t like him? He certainly wasn’t trying to win any popularity contests with Jenna.

It would be nice, though, if Neil didn’t have to fight through the negative perceptions of everybody else in town every time his foreman needed to do business with anyone in the Teton Valley.

“I’m only going to go for a little while tonight,” he said to Neil. “I’ll shake a few hands, stroke a few egos and be home in time to make sure everything’s ready for the guests coming in on Sunday.”

“Hate to break it to you, boss, but showing up to one Christmas party with the cattlemen’s association probably won’t do much to change anyone’s mind. Folks around here are set in their ways, afraid of anything that’s different.”

“What’s to be afraid of? We’re only trying to find more sustainable ways of doing business.”

“You don’t have to sell me, boss. I’m on board. I know what you’re doing here and I’m all for it. Our overhead is about half of a typical ranch of the same size and the land is already healthier after less than a year. It’s working. But what you’re doing is fairly radical. You can’t argue that. A lot of people think you’re crazy to go without hormones, to calve in the summer, to move your cattle to a new grazing spot every couple of days instead of weeks. That kind of thinking isn’t going to make you the most popular guy at the cattle growers’ association.”

“It can’t hurt to let people see I don’t intend to come out only on the weekends and hide out here at the ranch. I’m not trying to convert anybody, I just want folks to see I’m willing to step out and try to be part of the community.”

“A noble effort, I guess.”

“You don’t mind if I tag along with you and Melina, then?”

“I suppose that would be okay. You want her to find you a date? There’s some real nice-lookin’ girls around here who’d probably love to hit the town with a guy who has a private jet and one of them penthouses in San Francisco.”

Carson narrowed his eyes at his foreman, whose sun-weathered features only grinned back at him. “Thanks, but no,” Carson muttered. “I don’t need help in the dating department.”

“You change your mind, you let me know.”

“Don’t hold your breath. I’m not interested in a social life, just in a little public relations.”

Chapter Three

Two hours later, he reminded himself of the conversation with his foreman as he listened to the Pine Gulch mayor ramble on about every single civic event planned for the coming year, from the Founders’ Day parade to the Memorial Day breakfast to the annual tradition of decorating the town park for the holidays.

Public relations, he reminded himself. That was the only reason for his presence. If that meant expiring from boredom, it was a small price to pay.

“This is a nice town, as you’ll find when you’ve been here a little longer,” Mayor Wilson assured him. “A nice town full of real nice people. Why, I don’t guess there’s a more neighborly town in all of Idaho. You could have done a lot worse if you’d settled somewhere else.”

“I’m sure that’s true,” he murmured to the other man, wondering when he could politely leave.

At least the mayor was willing to talk to him. He supposed he ought to be grateful for that. While he wasn’t encountering outright hostility from people at the party, he had seen little of that neighborliness Mayor Wilson claimed. Most were polite to him but guarded, which was about what he expected.

The server walked past with more of those divine spinach rolls. He grabbed one as she passed by, hoping she wasn’t keeping track of his consumption since he knew he’d had more than his share.

At least the food was good. Better than good, actually. He had come in with fairly low culinary expectations. A stock growers’ holiday party in Pine Gulch, Idaho, wasn’t exactly high on his list of places to find haute cuisine.

But the menu was imaginative and every dish prepared exactly right. He paid a Cordon Bleu-trained personal chef to fill his refrigerator and freezer here and in San Francisco and he thought the food at this party was every bit as good as anything Jean-Marc prepared.

None of it was fancy but everything he had tried so far exploded with taste, from the mini crab cakes with wild mushrooms to the caramel tart he’d tasted to the spinach rolls he couldn’t get enough of.

He could only hope the personal chef he hired from Jackson Hole for the guests who were coming to Raven’s Nest in a few days was half as good as this caterer.

The house party was an important one for McRaven Enterprises and he wanted everything to be exactly right, especially since he had a feeling this was his one and only chance to convince Frederick Hertzog and his son, Dierk, to sell their cellular phone manufacturing business to McRaven Enterprises.

Frederick loved all things Western. When Carson learned he and his family were traveling from Germany to Salt Lake City for a ski vacation, he had made arrangements to fly them to Raven’s Nest for a few days in an effort to convince the man McRaven Enterprises was the best company to take Hertzog Communications and its vast network of holdings to the next level.

He and Hertzog had had a long discussion the last time they met about some of the range policies Carson was trying to emphasize at Raven’s Nest and the man was interested to see those efforts in action.

He expected to have more opportunities to entertain at Raven’s Nest. He preferred his solitude while he was here but he had built the house knowing some degree of entertaining was inevitable. It wouldn’t hurt to meet the caterer before he left, he decided. He could at least get a business card so he could pass it along to Carrianne, his enormously competent assistant who handled all his event-planning details.

The kitchen was at the rear of the community center. Just before he reached it, another server came through the doors carrying a tray laden with artfully arranged holiday sweets. Cookies and truffles and slices of nut bread.

He focused first on the food, wondering how upset she would be if he messed up her lovely tray by snatching one of those giant sugar cookies. He lifted his gaze to the server to ask and did a quick double take.

“Mrs. Wheeler!”