“Yes, ma’am.” There was no way he was putting up a fuss. If she wanted to go to town, the lady was going with him to town. Not till he heard her chuckling as she walked to the back door to change out of her boots, did he fully relax. The last thing he needed was to lose this job. Not with his record.
Clint shifted the truck into drive when the sound hit—high-pitched whine that morphed into a grinding squeal. Not good.
From the passenger seat, he heard Alice wince. “That doesn’t sound healthy.”
“No, ma’am.” He shifted back to park, cut the engine. “I’d better take a look.”
By a heartbeat, Alice beat him to the front of the truck. On her tippy toes, with the practiced ease of someone who had done this before, she was under the hood, scanning for the source of the horrid sound. Her hand moving from one spot to the other, he got the distinct impression that this woman had been under more metal than most men. She made a strangled sound that sounded an awful lot like a growl. “These blasted electronicengines. Give me the old days when all you needed to keep a truck running was a wrench and some baling wire.”
Clint couldn’t help but smile at that. “Simpler times.”
She eased back onto her heels and brushed her hands free of engine grime. “Got any ideas?”
He leaned in closer, listening to the faint tick of cooling metal. “Could be the serpentine belt. Or maybe the alternator.” He reached in, fingers tracing the path of the serpentine belt. “My money’s on this being the problem. Belt’s cracked, starting to fray. Probably slipping on the pulley.” He slammed the hood shut. “We’d better take another vehicle. I’ll pick up a new belt. Fix it after I get to the boards in the barn.”
“Okay.”
He felt more than saw her gaze on him as he cut the engine and retrieved the keys.
She fell into step beside him as they made their way to the other ranch truck. Hurrying to match his stride, she glanced up at him. “You seem to know an awful lot about an awful lot.”
“My mother would say, just enough to get myself into trouble.”
“Did you get into a lot of trouble?” Her question was genuine, but her tone was teasing.
He didn’t have to look at her to know those deep blue eyes would be sparkling with humor. “Usual stuff.”
“Who taught you to fix cars?”
“That would be my dad.”
“And the carpentry?”
“Dad’s Brother.” He opened the driver’s side door and pulled the keys out from under the mat. Before he could consider opening the door for her, she was already climbing into the passenger seat. “Grandpa was an electrician. Growing up, I learned pretty much everything I’d need to know to fix or build a house—or a ranch.”
Buckling her seat belt, she leaned against the door. “So how’d you wind up in ranching?”
“That would be Mom’s roots. I’d spend every summer at my grandparents’ ranch in Wyoming. I guess I loved cows and horses more than hammers and wrenches. According to my mother, I learned to ride before I could walk.” The memory was bittersweet. “They died when I was a teenager. Mom sold the ranch.”
Lips pressed tightly together, Alice nodded. “That must have been hard on your mom.”
“Yes and no. She loved the ranch as much as I did, but she loved Dad more. They were super tight. They…fit. Balanced each other.”
That made Alice smile. He liked seeing her smile. It was a nice smile. “Are they still in Wyoming?”
His chest felt suddenly tight. “My parents passed away not long after I went to—” He caught himself, suddenly aware of how close he’d come to revealing too much. “After I left home. Doctor said it was natural causes, that it was more common than you’d think for one partner to go shortly after the other. Especially when they were as close as my parents were.”
“I’m sorry.” Sympathy, not pity, shone in her eyes.
He had to wonder, would she look at him the same way if she knew what he knew? The only cause for his parents’ death was a broken heart. He’d broken their heart.
Chapter Four
Alice was going to have to learn to slow down. Going over the list of supplies Clint had dictated to her, she’d managed to decipher almost everything on her chicken scratch list. Save one. Tired of squinting at the page as if that was somehow going to make her letters legible, she shoved the list and pen into her pocket and headed out the back door.
At the barn, she found Benny cleaning out the hooves on a mare. “How’s it going?”
The kid lifted his face and smiled at her. “Great, Ms. Sweet.”
