Romancing the Rancher, page 2
Josie stopped and turned back, her long, black braid swinging over her shoulder. “Don’t you need your tools?”
He studied her carefully. “I need to see what’s up first.”
“Makes sense.” She nodded. “See you in a bit.”
“Looking forward to it already,” Evan called out as she headed toward the tack room.
He went into the mudroom, took off his boots, and padded through into the kitchen where he found Ines, hands on hips with her back to him, staring at the open dishwasher and shaking her head.
“Bom dia, Ines,” Evan said.
She spun around. She was a small woman who always wore her silver-streaked hair in a braided bun on the top of her head. “Evan, how lovely to see you.” She came over to kiss him on both cheeks. “I thought you were the repairman.”
“What’s up with it?” Evan joined her in staring at the dishwasher.
“It’s not draining properly. I told Rio I didn’t need one of these things and that I was quite happy washing up my own dishes, but he wouldn’t hear of it.”
Evan crouched down and looked inside the dishwasher where two inches of dirty water still lingered at the bottom. “That’s not good.”
“I was thinking about running it again, but Josie said I might end up flooding the kitchen, and that the best thing to do was call the repairman.”
Evan stood and leaned over to check the air gap sticking out of the countertop. “Have you looked at this?”
“I don’t even know what it is,” Ines confessed.
Evan tried to unscrew the cap, but it was stuck. He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out one of his gloves to get a good grip.
“That’s better.” Even as he released the cap, he saw the problem. He eased the chunk of what looked like half-chewed gristle out of the pipe, which then gave a satisfying gurgle and spewed out a mixture of bubbles and water. “That should clear it.”
Ines peered over his shoulder. “There was something stuck in there?”
“Yup, blocking the airflow.” He dropped the mangled piece of meat in the trash. “It should be fine now, but I’ll just check the pipes under the sink for any further blockage. Has the water been running through the faucet okay?”
“It hasn’t been great,” Ines admitted.
Evan rolled up his sleeves. “Then let’s take a look.”
* * *
After cleaning up in the barn, Josie walked into the kitchen to find the plumber laid full out on the floor, his head and shoulders under the sink, which gave her an opportunity to check out his flat stomach and long legs. The fact that he still looked like a cowboy but was actually a tradesman made her want to smile. But she already knew that Morgan Valley was a small town where everyone took on multiple roles.
There was a knock on the open back door and a cheery hello as another guy, complete with a toolbox came into the kitchen and stopped dead.
“Morning, Ines. Why’s there a Miller under your sink?”
Evan was a Miller? Josie winced as the sound of a thud came from the cabinet quickly followed by a curse as Evan slid into view, rubbing his skull. His short hair had more than a hint of red in it.
“Hey, Bart. Just trying to help out.” He pointed at the pipes. “Looks corroded to me, but you’re the expert.”
Bart set his toolbox on the tiled floor. “I thought this was a dishwasher issue.”
“I fixed that part.” Evan got to his feet and grinned at the older man. He really was ridiculously attractive. “The pipes are your problem.”
“Thanks for nothing,” Bart said, but as he was smiling back at Evan, Josie didn’t think he was really offended. “Don’t expect a cut of my bill.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Evan said, his gaze finally settling on Josie. “Hey.”
“Hey.”
Ines touched her shoulder. “Why don’t you and Evan go and get acquainted while I finish up with Bart? I just made a fresh pot of coffee and some banana muffins. You can take them through to the family room.”
“That would be great.” Josie turned to Evan, who was regarding her with great interest. “Do you want to grab a couple of plates and I’ll get the coffee?”
“Sure.” He was already on the move and obviously familiar with the layout of the recently renovated kitchen as he found the plates first go. “Shout if you need any more help, Bart, okay?”
Bart muttered something uncomplimentary. Josie fought a smile as she poured out two mugs of coffee and set them on the tray with the muffins, cream, and sugar. She walked through to the sunny family room where she found Evan standing by the large woodburning fireplace.
“You’re Rio’s sister.”
Josie set the tray down. “Wow, when did you finally work that out?”
He pointed at the mantelpiece above the fireplace. “You’re in the photos with Rio and his mom.”
“You should be a detective. Isabelle is my mom, too. Rio and I have different fathers. I gather you’re a Miller.”
“Yeah, the youngest apart from Daisy.”
“Your brother Adam was married to Ines’s daughter.” Josie sat down and added cream to her coffee.
“Correct.” Evan sat in the chair opposite and took his coffee black. “He’s very fond of her and this place.”
“It really is lovely. So peaceful and tranquil.”
Evan made a face. “If you like that kind of thing.”
“You don’t?”
He set his mug back down. “I don’t know anything else. I’ve never been anywhere.”
“Like ever?”
Josie couldn’t keep the surprise out of her voice. She’d traveled between Brazil and the USA since she was a small child and had gone even farther afield with her job at Howatch International.
“Nope.” He eyed her consideringly. “Never felt the need until recently.”
“I suppose it’s good you’re happy here and know that you belong,” Josie said cautiously. “I’ve never felt like that about anywhere I’ve lived.”
“The thing is—” Evan said, and then stopped, his brow furrowed.
“Go on,” Josie said encouragingly. “You can say anything you want. I’m not going to tell anyone.”
He grinned. “You have no idea how appealing that is to someone who lives in a small town where every damn thing you do gets reported back to your family.” Evan paused again. “I want to change some stuff and I don’t know where to start.”
“Like what?” Josie leaned toward him. If she wanted to avoid facing her own problems, solving someone else’s was a great opportunity to procrastinate. It was central to her nature to want to fix things.
“Stupid shit, stuff I’ve never been able to do because—” He half smiled. “You’re going to think I’m nuts.”
“Does it matter if I do?” Josie asked. “Let me put it this way. I’m here for at least a month on vacation, I’ve got a lot of time on my hands, and helping you achieve your goals seems like a great idea.”
“You’re going to help me?” Evan looked taken aback.
“Isn’t that what you want?”
He studied her for a long, unnerving minute. “I don’t even know you.”
“You know I’m Rio’s sister and that I’m willing to help.”
He frowned. “Hold up a minute. Number one, you don’t know what I want to do, and number two, your brother would kill me if I got you into trouble.”
“My brother’s not here right now, and if you’re worried, why don’t you draw up a to-do list, and I’ll decide whether I want to help you or not?” Josie offered.
Evan sipped his coffee. “Maybe I’m not the only one who’s nuts around here. What’s up with you?”
She met his hazel-eyed gaze and tried to be honest. “I . . . need to focus on something that isn’t related to my work or myself.”
“What do you do workwise?”
“I’m a VP of Finance at Howatch International.”
“That’s Rio’s dad’s company, right?” Evan helped himself to a banana muffin and devoured it in two bites.
“Yes. Rio insisted I had to take a load of unused vacation days off before I lost them.” It was a lot more complicated than that, but Evan didn’t need to know everything. “I decided to come here and help out on the ranch.”
“Doesn’t your mom have a ranch in Brazil?”
“I . . . didn’t want her fussing over me.” Josie tried for a smile. “She already thinks I work too hard and I didn’t want to admit she might have a point.”
Evan nodded. He’d obviously met Isabelle and knew about her flair for the dramatic. “So, I’d be like your pet project or something?”
“Not exactly. I mean, I’m just offering to help if you need someone.” Josie blew out a breath. “Okay, it was a stupid idea. Why don’t we forget I suggested it and have some more coffee?”
“Hell, no. How about this?” Evan held her gaze. “We both write out lists and help each other out. I bet you have some stupid stuff you’d love to do on your vacation.” He rose to his feet. “Let me get more coffee while you start thinking.”
Chapter Two
After agreeing to meet Josie at the Red Dragon Bar in town that evening, Evan left the Martinez place and fixed fencing for three hours, his mind abuzz with ideas. When he got back home, he spent some time rubbing Joker down and making sure he had plenty of water before heading into the house. For some reason, he was reluctant to see everyone, and was relieved there was no one around when he entered the kitchen.
Being stuck close to home after heart surgery meant his dad had an unnerving habit of appearing from nowhere, asking questions about Evan’s work, and why was he back home when there was still plenty to do. Although Evan had some sympathy with his dad’s plight of being confined, the endless questioning was already starting to grate on him. As the youngest son, he’d always had plenty of cover to do his own thing, but with Ben and Kaiden no longer working full-time on the ranch, he was way more visible than he liked.
He stopped and stared out of the window that faced the rolling foothills and the long dancing lines of the white paddock fencing. Was this it? Would he be staring at this view when he was ninety while Adam’s kids ran the place and laughed behind their backs at their old uncle Evan who’d never been anywhere or done anything in his life?
His cell buzzed and he took it out of his pocket.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, it’s Danny.”
Evan straightened up. “Hey.”
There was a long pause before Danny sighed. “I guess you’re still mad at me.”
“Why would you think that?” Evan shut off the faucet and took the filled jug over to the coffee maker. “You don’t owe me a thing.”
“I had to move fast, and Silver offered to help, and—”
Evan cut him off. “Hey, I’m in the middle of something right now. Can you call Dad if this is urgent?”
“Evan, it’s lunchtime. I know you.” There was a hint of amusement in Danny’s voice. “You’re either in the kitchen getting something to eat, or out on the ranch having a chicken salad sandwich. That’s why I called, because I knew exactly where you’d be.”
“Maybe I’m not,” Evan insisted.
“Bro . . .”
“Gotta go.” Evan cut off the call and returned his cell phone to the back pocket of his jeans.
Sure, Danny would probably be complaining to Faith about how juvenile he was being, but he didn’t care. He wasn’t ready to talk to his brother yet and that was the end of it.
The smell of coffee wafted over from the machine and Evan opened the refrigerator to find the fixings for his favorite sandwich. He stared at the mayo, chicken, tomato, and lettuce he’d automatically selected. Was he really that predictable? And, even if he was—so what? Just because all his siblings were marrying movie stars, hotshot lawyers, or making out big-time in the IT stock market didn’t mean he had to.
There was nothing wrong with being like Adam, finding a local girl to settle down with, and running the family ranch. Evan went into the pantry to fetch the bread. Except Adam would own the ranch and Evan wouldn’t.
“Jeez . . .” Evan spoke into the quiet stillness. “Maybe you’d better take Josie Martinez up on her offer and finish writing that list, loser.”
* * *
Josie sat opposite Ines at the kitchen table and listened to her chat about her neighbors, the valley, and all kinds of delicious gossip to bring Josie up to speed with what was going down in her brother’s new home. It seemed a world away from San Francisco and Boston where she spent the majority of her days, scurrying between appointments in the narrow-shadowed streets between skyscrapers.
Burnout—that’s what her doctors had called it—which was a kind way of saying she wasn’t up to the job. Not that anyone had made her feel bad for taking time off. In fact, they’d insisted on it. Had she been messing up so badly by that point that they’d all been relieved to see the back of her?
“Josie?”
She blinked and looked across at Ines’s concerned face. “I’m sorry, I missed that.”
Ines reached over and took her hand. “It’s my fault. Rio said you needed to rest, and here I am chatting away without a care in the world.” Ines hesitated. “If there is anything you’d like to talk to me about, I’m more than willing to listen.”
Josie automatically touched the small scar on her cheek, hearing the sounds of breaking glass and the pounding of her heart, as she attempted to make herself as small as possible imprinted on her brain like a photograph. The flashbacks came at the most inconvenient moments and she couldn’t seem to stop them.
“I’m just glad to be here.” She smiled at Ines. “Although, I guess it is going to take me a while to slow down to country time.”
“I bet.” Ines squeezed her fingers and then withdrew her hand. “Have you finished eating? At least we have a working dishwasher to put our dirty dishes in now.”
“After two experts worked on it.” Josie joked as she rose to take her plate over to the sink.
“Evan Miller is a very nice young man. He’s always willing to help out and he never makes me feel bad about asking.”
“I don’t know much about him,” Josie said casually. “He’s the youngest, right?”
“Of the five boys. Daisy is a couple of years younger than him.” Ines carefully rinsed the plates and Josie stacked them in the dishwasher.
“Daisy, the tech millionaire?”
“Yes, she’s done very well for herself.” Ines smiled. “Jeff Miller doesn’t usually have a complimentary word to say about his children, but he’s very proud of her.”
“So, Evan’s got a lot to live up to,” Josie said thoughtfully.
“I don’t think it bothers him. He’s too busy living a carefree life at home.”
Josie considered that as they finished clearing the table. Evan hadn’t seemed very happy with his life when she’d talked to him earlier. She was already half regretting her offer to help him out. What if she just made things worse and he ended up alienated from his family?
She checked the time on the kitchen clock. She’d go for a long ride to get her head together. The idea of writing her own list of stupid things to do hovered tantalizingly in her mind.... Maybe it was time for her to get a little funky in her thinking. When she got back, she’d decide whether she was going to meet Evan at the bar in town or leave him well alone. The last thing she wanted to do was mess up someone else’s life.
* * *
Evan checked his cell phone and realized he hadn’t given Josie his number to contact him in case she decided not to come. There were several messages and texts from various members of his family, but he was definitely ignoring those. He settled himself onto the barstool and took another sip of his beer. She’d probably decided he wasn’t worth her time and he couldn’t blame her.
Midweek, the bar wasn’t full, as most of the ranchers and cowboys were busy with the harvest or rounding up cattle, and only came in on the weekends. There were a few tourists scattered around and the occasional lucky person who lived in town and could walk to the bar. Evan’s mother had recently bought an apartment in the converted old movie theater across the way and had given them all a key.
The smell of fried onions and garlic wafted in from the dining end of the establishment where Bella Williams and her staff offered good old-fashioned diner food and plenty of it. Evan’s stomach growled, and Nancy who was working behind the bar grinned at him.
“Hungry?”
“You could say that.” Evan drank more beer. He’d ducked out of the house just before Adam had announced a family Zoom call to congratulate Danny and Faith.
“Why don’t you go and eat, then?”
“I’m waiting for someone.”
“Like a date?” Nancy perked up. Evan belatedly remembered that she was an even worse gossip than he was and knew everyone in the valley.
He gave her the eye. “Like I’d tell you if I was.”
“Man, I thought you Millers had run out of women around here.”
“I’ve never dated you,” Evan pointed out.
Nancy smiled sweetly. “That’s because I haven’t asked you. I prefer my men older and less responsible than you’ll ever be.”
“So, you’re saying I’m boring?”
Nancy considered him, her head on one side. “You’re . . . ‘okay.’”
“Wow, thanks for the vote of confidence.” Evan checked his cell again. “I’ll have another beer when you’re ready.”
“Make that two.”
He swung around to see that Josie was standing right behind him. She’d left her hair loose and wore an embroidered white shirt, jeans, and flowery cowboy boots. Her lipstick was as red as the roses on her shirt and her boots. Even as he smiled at her, Evan couldn’t help but wonder how much of his conversation with Nancy she’d overheard.
“You came.” Evan pulled out the barstool next to his.
