While she’d put Aubrey in charge of designing the dining room, she was micromanaging the hell out of the configuration of her kitchen.
“You’re driving the contractors crazy, you know that, right?”
“I want everything to be perfect.” She gazed up at him, her eyes twinkling.
“It will be.” He bent down to taste her lips and let the kiss linger. “Because you’re perfect. But if we don’t get going, we’ll be late.”
“You’re the one making out with me in my restaurant.” She squeezed his butt and kissed him one more time before grabbing her purse off one of the sawhorses. Then she led the way outside.
In Sawyer’s Range Rover, they took the new paved lane that bypassed their homes and emptied out at Dry Creek Road about two miles from the ranch gate. The new entrance would be used by diners and shoppers, while the old gate was solely for family. In the end, everyone had decided that privacy was worth the cost of a separate road.
Sawyer snuck a quick glance at his watch. “They’ll all beat us there.”
“Sorry.”
He reached over and squeezed her knee. “Nothing to apologize for.” The fact was, he didn’t know how she managed to organize her time so well. Between getting a new restaurant off the ground, prepping for a new television show, and juggling her other business interests, she still made plenty of quality time for them.
“I still can’t believe it,” she said. “Do you think your parents are crazy?”
Sawyer laughed. “Crazydoesn’t begin to describe it. But definitely crazy in a good way. I just wish my grandfather was alive, but I know he’s looking down, smiling his ass off.”
He hung a left at Beals Ranch, drove through the gate, and continued up the private gravel road. A collection of vehicles was parked in front of the ranch house, his mother’s Mercedes standing out among the pickup trucks and his aunt and uncle’s SUV.
He and Gina let themselves into the house to be greeted by his entire family. Even Travis, Grady, and Ellie were there.
The place looked bare without the Bealses’ furniture. Someone had dragged in an old picnic table and two benches. Aubrey, so pregnant she looked ready to burst, sat on a folding chair. Cash stood over her, his hand on her shoulder. While Charlie was nowhere near as round as Aubrey, she too had started to show. Sawyer figured Jace had knocked her up on their honeymoon.
“We ready to do this?” Sawyer’s dad held up a bottle of Dom Pérignon.
“Oh, Dan.” His mother searched the kitchen counter. “I forgot the flutes. We have no glasses.”
Uncle Jed laughed. “I could probably scrounge up a few Solo cups in my trunk.”
He started to go out to his SUV but Jace stopped him. “Let’s just pass around the bottle.”
“Works for me,” Jed said, though Cash’s mom pulled a face.
Sawyer’s dad popped the cork and held the bottle in the air. “To our family. May this new venture of ours flourish and may my late father, Jasper Dalton, smile down on his legacy.” Dan tilted his head toward the ceiling. “Pop, we know you’re up there, looking down, proud as hell of your grandsons.”
Dan swiveled around and found Jace. “Son, more than anything, we wish your folks and baby brother could be here too. We loved them and miss them every day. But we know they’d be especially proud of you and Charlie.” He zoomed in on Charlie’s belly, then glanced across the room to Aubrey and smiled “Well done, kiddos. Sawyer and Gina, we expect someday soon you’ll be next. To more Daltons and to Dry Creek Ranch!”
“Hear, hear,” everyone shouted.
Jed grabbed the bottle from Dan and again raised it. “To my brother and Wendy. Without them this couldn’t have happened.”
There was another raucous round of “Hear, hears.”
Cash turned to Jace. “Do you have the sign?”
“Right here.” Jace held up a large package wrapped in brown paper. “Let’s do it!”
On cue, everyone followed Jace outside, got into their respective vehicles and drove the mile to the ranch gate, where they parked on the dirt shoulder.
One by one, they filed out of their trucks and SUVs and gathered around the entrance. Jace climbed on top of the cab of his Ford. Cash got in the bed and handed him up the package. With a pocketknife, Jace made quick work of the wrapping. Down came the iron Beals Ranch logo that hung from the wooden crossbeam of the gate and up went a beautifully carved Dry Creek Ranch sign with the Dalton brand.
Gina snapped a few pictures with her phone. “I’ll post it to social media.”
Jed hauled out the opened bottle of champagne and they took turns passing it around. When everyone had had a sip, even the kids, Sawyer smashed the bottle against the gatepost to christen their new property.
