The Rancher's Surprise Baby

“We won’t.”

“You know this is going on the front page of the Gazette if we do,” he said.

“I expect you to use your connection at the paper to keep that from happening.”

He chuckled and shook his head. “What the hell? Not as if I’m going to get any work done tonight anyway.”

“And it’ll be a lot more fun than sitting out here waiting for Mr. Kitty to make an appearance.”

“Mr. Kitty?”

“Makes him seem less scary.” She jumped to her feet. “Be right back.”

Mandy hurried inside and pulled on her sneakers, trying not to think about how excited she was to go out pranking with Ben. Or how the idea of it seemed to dispel her earlier fatigue and frustration. She didn’t dawdle, not wanting him to have second thoughts. Maybe she should let him go home. Maybe she could ignore how much she liked being around him. But she simply didn’t want to.

He looked up at her approach. “We’re really doing this?”

“Come on. Live a little.”

She expected him to call a halt to her crazy plan, but when he didn’t, she nearly sprinted to his truck. Granted, that probably wasn’t the wisest move when a mountain lion could be lurking about. She’d probably just made herself look even more like dinner. But she made it safely and breathed in a quick, deep inhalation while Ben took one more look at the surrounding area before opening his door.

His truck smelled like him—a mixture of horses, leather and another striking scent that reminded her of pine trees and long, tall Texans making Wranglers the sexiest piece of clothing on the planet.

Ben secured the rifle in the rack in the back window then slid into the driver’s seat. “I must be crazy doing this.”

“Sometimes you need a little crazy in your life to make things interesting.”

As Ben turned the truck around and headed down her driveway, she watched his hands on the steering wheel. They looked strong, probably also a little rough from his work on the family ranch. She really needed to find a safe topic of conversation before he caught her staring or, heaven forbid, drooling. Maybe she ought to toilet-paper Devon’s house instead for putting these kinds of hot-and-bothered thoughts in her head in the first place.

“So, did Greg happen to say what all he was going to have to fix on my car?”

“No, just that it would take a few days.”

“Well, that’s frustratingly vague.”

“Just part of the frustrating theme of the day.”

“It wasn’t all bad.”

Ben glanced across the cab at her. “Which part exactly didn’t make you want to crawl under the covers and start over tomorrow?”

Now, why had he gone and mentioned crawling under the covers? Images that had no place taking up residence in her head strolled right in and made themselves at home.

“Let’s see. I may have been on my feet all day, but at least I have a job.” She held up two fingers. “I did have some nice wine before my feline scare.” She pointed out the windshield at the road in front of them. “And this will be fun. I haven’t done anything like this since high school. Oh, but don’t tell my mother that. I don’t want her image of me as the perfect child to be shattered.”

He chuckled. “I doubt my mom thinks of me as the perfect child.”

“I was under the impression you and your mom have a good relationship.”

“We do. There’s no doubt she loves me. She’s just not blind.”

“My mom isn’t blind,” she said with mock offense.

He looked over at her, eyebrow raised. “Uh-huh.”

Mandy playfully swatted his upper arm with the backs of her fingers, which just made him laugh even more.

When they rolled into town, she directed him to the alley behind the strip of stores along Main Street. He parked outside the back door of A Good Yarn. She fumbled with her ring of keys when he stepped up behind her. She’d swear she could feel his warm breath on her neck and wondered what would happen if she turned to face him.

Oh, get a grip on your hormones, woman.

She managed to finally slip the right key into the lock. A rush of cool air wafted over her when she opened the door. She flicked on the light to the storage room just inside the door and Ben entered behind her.

“You’d think we live in North Dakota judging by how much yarn you’ve got here.”

She noticed him eyeing the shelves of brightly colored yarns stretching up one wall. “Knitting is enjoying a resurgence in popularity.”

“It must be, to support a store in a town this size.”

“We have other things, too.” She pointed toward the shelves filled with bolts of cloth, sewing notions, candles, soaps and a variety of other craft items. “And tourism is growing by leaps and bounds, which really helps.”

He nodded. “I’ve gotten a bit more work because of the rodeos.”

“Saddles, right? I saw the article Arden did about them.”

“Yeah.”

Realization hit her. “That’s what you were going to work on tonight, isn’t it? I’m sorry. I get myself caught up in stuff sometimes.”

“It’s okay. The way today has gone, I would’ve probably just nailed my thumb to the saddle anyway. Or cut it off.”

“So I’m actually performing a service, then, saving you from yourself.”

He huffed out a laugh. “Where were you when that pigeon attacked me?”

“I can’t be everywhere at once.” She kicked one of the boxes that contained the streamers. “Let’s usher this day out on a fun note.”

* * *

MANDY WAS RIGHT. Turning Greg’s truck into what looked like a pickup-shaped piece of cotton candy was just what he needed to lift his mood. The only problem was he was having a hard time not cracking up. From the light in Mandy’s eyes and the way she kept having to cover her mouth, it appeared she was having the same problem. When she snorted after tying a big pink bow on the truck’s trailer hitch, he nearly lost it.

“You know, this can also be a long-time-coming payback for when Greg got me in trouble in high school. He hung those pictures of swimsuit models all over the school and put Mr. Kushner’s face on them, then swore up and down that I did it.”

“I remember that. It was hilarious. Well, not that you got in trouble if he did it.”

“Oh, he did it, all right.”

“Why didn’t you tell everyone it was him?”