He frowned. “You could get it off.” Immediately he wanted to take those words back, swallow them, and shove them into the dark crevices of his soul. How embarrassing.
“No, you misunderstand. I’ll be working at the gala.” She gestured to the sign above the building that he’d been staring at. “That’s where I work. I moved here to help run it. I’m not in charge or anything, but it’s a great opportunity for growth regardless.”
His stomach flipped.
This was perfect.
She was working for his charity.
He had an in!
Noah nearly jumped up and down but restrained himself. Then, as cooly as he could muster, he murmured, “I guess I’ll see you there, after all.”
“Guess so.”
CHAPTER FOUR
The last monthhad been a whirlwind of craziness. Jane knew it was a lot of work to put together a gala of this caliber—but she’d naively figured that it would be a step or several down from the ones she’d read about taking place in bigger cities.
Nope. No such luck.
Bo Reese had been insistent that they could handle a huge event like this one. He’d told her to tell her boss and the higher-ups that this would be the party of the century—at least for the state of Montana.
When she’d assured him that they had the options to scale back, he’d refused.
So here she was, spending most of her day prepping for the gala at the ranch. After tomorrow, she’d have to supervise clean-up. They got word from the higher-ups that they wanted the ranch to be pristine when they were done.
She’d figured they had rules for that sort of thing. Policies and procedures would be in place. But the fact that the people incharge told them to ensure it happened made her wonder if a different gala had ended poorly.
Either way, she’d been the one selected to supervise the clean-up process. She didn’t mind. Was she a higher up? No. Did she make most of the decisions? Also no. But that was why she’d come out here, right? There had been no room for growth at the other location any time soon, and she needed the money.
No one knew about the sacrifices she’d made to take care of her grandfather. He’d served in the military, too, but things turned out differently for him when he was diagnosed with early onset dementia. It cost a whole lot of money to have him in a facility that could help him. They called it memory care. And it was nice to see they were putting priority on making sure he remembered to eat and get up in the morning.
Still, she hated that she’d had to move as far as she had just so she could help pay for it.
Her parents had insisted that she didn’t have to help—they wanted her worrying about her own life. But Jane knew that was just code for they were disappointed they couldn’t take care of her grandfather on their own.
Maybe that was the reason they didn’t blatantly tell her how disappointed they were she hadn’t started a family. The guilt could be a massive factor in that.
Jane stood firm in her decisions. She wasn’t going to let her parents tell her what to do. She loved her grandfather, and this job was one of the only reasons they could afford the care he was getting. If she stopped sending money, they would have to send him to a place that not only smelled funny but was also in a bad part of town.
She shuddered to think of it and turned to her clipboard. Her only job today would be to check off what had been done and make any notes for what would be needed tomorrow morning. The gala would be in the evening, and then she’d be taking charge of clean-up.
Her manager had left already, making sure to use his skill to delegate.
Jane rolled her eyes. It was fine, though. She was good at the organizing and checking her list. She could usually see when something wasn’t quite right.
Like now.
Jane frowned as she moved closer to the platform they’d built. It was a large area with a railing all the way around save for a few areas that had steps down to a gravel path. The path lead in two directions. One to a beautiful garden area. The other to where parking would be located.
The platform in question had tables and chairs at its perimeter with an open area for dancing in the middle. This gala was one where people paid per table to be in attendance, and there would be a live performance by a country music star who had grown up in this area.
Jane’s family had never really gotten into that sort of thing, so she didn’t know who the performer was.
The problem with the platform was that it was high enough to create a problem when it got dark. The railing would help, but she knew something had been missing, and now she’d figured it out.
She snapped her fingers to one of the cowboys who was helping with wrapping lights around the railing. He glanced up at her then wandered over. “Yes, ma’am?”
